YEREVAN. – Zaruhi Postanjyan has the freedom to express her view, and she exercised that freedom. 

Armenia’s opposition Heritage Party Chairman, ex-presidential candidate and former FM, Raffi Hovannisian told the aforesaid to Armenian News-NEWS.am. 

He responded to the query as to whether or not the question, which Postanjyan—who is Heritage’s National Assembly Faction Secretary and member of Armenia’s delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE)—had posed to President Serzh Sargsyan in the recent PACE session, had been sanctioned by the party earlier. 

“Zaruhi Postanjyan is an established politician; I am very proud of her. She has her unique style and substance. One should not be afraid of representing the people’s interests,” Hovannisian said.     

In his words, if it were not for the limited time to pose a question, Heritage’s MP would have said lot more at PACE.

“I believe Zaruhi said too little,” Hovannisian said.

As per the opposition party leader, the MP’s question was, “a more direct, human, [and] a simpler question.” 

Raffi Hovannisian stated, however, that he did not like President’s Sargsyan’s response to the question.

“Any public person should be able to calmly answer questions,” he added.

As per Hovannisian, what Postanjyan did is a lesson.

“It was a lesson, an elementary civic education. Any official shall be accountable to the people,” Raffi Hovannisian maintained.   

To note, during the question and answer session at Wednesday’s PACE plenary session in Strasbourg, France, Zaruhi Postanjyan had asked Armenia’s President Serzh Sargsyan the following question:

“You have appeared here [in the PACE session] not by the will of the people, but [rather] as a consequence of organized crime, the theft of the Armenian people’s vote. Therefore you cannot de jure represent the will and right of the Armenian people. [So,] I’ll give you another question. Have you been to a casino in Europe and lost 70 million euros there? And who paid that amount in your stead?”     

Photo by Arsen Sargsyan/NEWS.am